Upham Group celebrates high Christmas sales

Upham Group plc — which comprises a chain of pubs, as well as a brewery — is celebrating total gross pub sales of £2.3m in the final five trading weeks of 2017.

That was a rise of 6.5% year-on-year and included the highest grossing sales day in Upham’s history — New Year’s Eve — when £112,000 was taken.

The brewery successfully launched Upham’s new craft beer, UB5, selling more than 4,000 pints in December.

The Weighbridge Brewhouse, in Swindon, took the top sales spot over the festive period, followed by The Navigator, in Lower Swanwick, Southampton.

The strong performance was driven largely by food sales of just above £1.2m, with drink sales topping £800,000. Bedroom occupation was also relatively high for the time of year, accounting for around 13% of total pub revenue.

Chief executive, Chris Phillips, said: “This strong Christmas performance rounds off a good year for the Upham Group, despite a difficult trading environment for the sector.

“2017 was a productive year. In addition to pursuing our pub acquisition strategy, we also launched our first ever craft beer, which continued to sell extremely well throughout December.

“I would like to thank the teams at all our pubs for their fantastic Christmas menus, as well as the rest of our staff who made this such a successful few weeks. We enter 2018 with good momentum, and look forward to welcoming even more customers over the course of the year.”